Purpose
by erinkatemellark
Summary: David Jacobs is a quiet, bookish boy who is on an endless quest for knowledge. Stella Friedman is a fierce intellectual who demands positive change. Both want to be more than their working class immigrant backgrounds seem to allow. When they meet each other and become tangled with the Newsies and their strike, they start their journey toward purpose.
1. Pre-Chapter

Stella Friedman lived in lower Manhattan on the 4th floor of a large tenement apartment building. She was short in stature with a small frame and long brown curls and big, round hazel eyes. Her parents were two Polish Jews, Joseph and Eva, who shared Stella's hazel eyes and messy brunette curls. Her mother stayed home with her 5 children , and her father worked as an assistant to the butcher at the market next door. Stella was the second oldest of her 4 siblings at age 17. The oldest child Alexander was aged 23 and lived in Brooklyn with his wife Sarah and a baby on the way. Her other three siblings were Rosa (14) Elise (9) and Elle (5). Together, the Friedman family did their best to get by in the conditions they were in.

Stella was a peculiar girl.

She preferred reading and writing to sewing and gossip. In fact, when she wasn't working at the local fruit stand to help support her family she was reading philosophy and literature. As a child of immigrant parents, she was grateful that she was afforded the opportunity to go to school, but it just wasn't enough to satisfy all of her intellectual inquiries. The public schools taught basic intellectual skills such as reading, writing, and mathematics, but it was more about teaching the future industrial class to follow orders and be good workers. Stella longed for an environment where ideas can be explored and debates over contrasting philosophies were on the daily agenda. Sadly, being a poor 1st generation American and a woman made this fantasies virtually unattainable.

David Jacobs was a quiet boy. He lived in the tenement building on the other side of Stella's. His parents were also immigrants (from Russia). His father Aaron worked at the dock unloading crates and his mother Barbra made money here and there selling dresses and making alterations. She worked at home so she could always be there for her boys David and Les.

Unlike Stella, David was content with school. In fact, he was more than content with learning anything at all. School was his escape from the misery of working class life. He enjoyed reading in his spare time, and took pleasure in memorizing facts about current events and politics. His real love though was mathematics. David Jacobs was a prodigy when it came to equations and long division. He found a certain pleasure in finding a definite answer as if solving a puzzle.

These two individuals have endless potential, but with the odds stacked against them due to their working class backgrounds they fear they are doomed to a life a mediocrity. They need something big, something powerful to prove to the world that they are more than they seem.


	2. Chapter 1

A/N: Here's the first real chapter. Thank you for all the kind reviews of the pre-chapter. I hope you guys enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters except for the OCs.

Stella Friedman sat above the bustling lower Manhattan streets on her fire escape.

She pondered the view of the city below her feet. There is little beauty to be found in industrial Manhattan itself, but she found beauty in the people. The diversity of ethnicity and thought was just astounding. As she sat above it all and people watched she couldn't help but wonder what was going on in everyone's minds.

How does the police officer on the corner see the world?

The grocer?

The bartender?

The foreman of the Pentagon Shirtwaist Factory?

She thought about how perception was a beautiful mystery of humankind.

"Stella!" called her mother impatiently from the kitchen. "Stop wasting your day away on that fire escape and come help me in the kitchen. Men are threatened by women who think too much. Women who are skilled in the art of maintaining the household are the ones who end up married at a reasonable age."

Stella sighed "Mama I'm barely 17! I have plenty of time to worry about marriage. I'm not going to waste my time preparing for the rest of my life. I'm going to do what makes me happy now while I still can."

Eva Friedman rolled her eyes "It is never too early to learn how to be a respectable young woman. Every girl your age needs to learn how to bake a proper pie and carry herself with dignity and grace in or to garner any male attention period. Not to mention how to tame their curls Miss Stella."

Stella got up from her place on the fire escape and confronted her mother in the kitchen.

"If I have to forsake who I am to get male attention, then I'd much rather be an old spinster with a cat as a companion than married to a man who likes me for my ability to bake a damn pie! If I ever _do _decide to date or marry a man it will be on my own terms. I want to be madly and powerfully in love or have no one at all. More importantly, I want to be loved in return for _me_ despite my chaos and unladylike habits."

"Well Stella" said her mother with a mix of anger and sadness in her eyes "We don't live in a world where you have the option of not being a lady. Marriage is essential to our survival because women need to be protected. We don't have the rights that men do or even the ones that well-off women do. I hope that you find a man out there that you love, I really do. But just know that not getting married means a life of danger for women like us? I learned to love your father with all I have, but do you think I loved him when we got married? I didn't even speak with him before my wedding day. I just had to trust that the matchmaker would give me a strong man that could protect me and provide for me."

Deep down inside Stella feared her mother's words. She knew that she was right and that she certainly wasn't marriage material, but she didn't want to give up her quest for knowledge no matter what.

"I love you mama" Stella said as she hugged her distressed mother. "I love you too _moja droga_" replied Eva while she ran her fingers through Stella's chocolate curls.

Stella decided to ask her mother what she could do to help prepare for dinner as she didn't want to upset her anymore than she already did. Her mother sent her out to the market to buy cabbage for her famous _haluski. _Stella's mother handed her the 3 cents she would need to purchase the cabbage. She carefully took the coins and placed them in her satchel along with the copy of _Crito _(Plato) that she needed to return to the library.

She headed out of her apartment, slowly closing the chipped front door and went down the cascade of stairs onto the busy Manhattan street. Stella was immediately overwhelmed with the sights and sounds of her neighborhood. From the rattling of the carriages to the mothers trying to corral their screaming children, this city was chaotic, but to Stella it was home.

The sight and sound that always seemed to captivate Stella the most was the newsboy on the corner yelling the day's headline. He appeared to be a very sickly boy with bright yet sad eyes, reddish blonde and a single crutch that kept him steady.

She pitied the boy.

She knew what it was like to be poor and could barely imagine what it would be like to be on the streets selling newspapers barely being able to stand. It upset Stella that such inequalities existed in this world. There were people like Vanderbildts and the Rockefellers who had all the money in the world and lived in the lap of luxury while people like this poor newspaper boy struggled for survival.

Stella turned to the market just next door to her tenement apartment building in search of the cabbage that her mother requested. It was then that she noticed a small boy arguing with his older brother. The younger boy seemed around the age of one of her sisters with brown hair and eyes. The older one seemed to be around her own age. He was very tall in stature, lanky almost, with dark brown hair and and a serious look on his face. He looked very well put together, but based on the type of clothes he was wearing it was clear that he was poor like her.

Stella didn't realize she was staring at the pair until the older boy looked slightly in her direction and then away very quickly. She pulled herself out of her trance and quickly bought the cabbages and started on her five block walk to the public library.

Despite going to the library at least every other day, it never failed to amaze Stella that all that knowledge could be in one place. She quietly returned _Crito _and went on a hunt for a new book to check out. After gazing at the politics and philosophy section for about fifteen minutes, she noticed a familiar face two shelves down.

It was the older boy from the market.

It wasn't all that often that Stella took the time to remember the faces of strangers, but for some reason she had remembered his. She rifles through the selections before spotting _On the Subjection of Women _by John Stuart Mill on the very top shelf. She was drawn to it because of the conversation she had with her mother just an hour prior. Standing at only 5 feet and two inches, Stella was having quite the struggle reaching the top shelf. She tried with all her might to reach it by standing on her tippy toes, but she was still just a bit off from reaching the book. She was startled when a tall figure came right up behind her and reached for the same book on the top shelf.

She turned around quickly just to notice that it was the boy from the market.

"Here you go" he said timidly. " I noticed that you were reaching for this one and I thought I'd help you out." Stella looked up at him and smiled shyly. "Thank you" she uttered as she took the book from his hands. "Great choice by the way" the boy said. "I read it a few months ago after finishing _On Liberty _one of Mill's other books. It was fantastic, it really made me reflect on how women are treated in our society."

Stella was shocked to see a boy her age express any interest in philosophy let alone the rights of women. Stella replied "It's been on my reading list for a long time. I too enjoyed _On Liberty _and I want to see how it would be applied to people like me. You know, women." The boy smiled and held out his hand and stumbled "I'm David Jacobs by the way, I think we go to the same school." Stella accepted the handshake and replied "I'm Stella Friedman. I know it may sound rude, but I don't recall seeing you around school David." David shuffled a bit "I'm not really much of a social butterfly. I spend most of my time reading by myself when class isn't in session." Stella smiled sweetly "I relate to that. I mean, I have one friend that I talk to during lunch and before school, but other than that I am also a pretty solitary person."

Stella thought to herself for a second before saying "David, you seem to have a great taste in books. You're welcome to join my friend Cecilia Barks and me for lunch under the big oak tree if you ever get too lonely." David smiled and nodded politely "Thank you. I really appreciate your offer."

Stella held her book to her chest tightly and said "I best be headed home, my mother is waiting on the vegetables I bought to make dinner. Where do you live? Maybe we can walk back together, I've been dying to meet someone who I can actually discuss Mill with." David smiled and replied "523 Orchard Street." "Great!" said Stella "My building is the one right next to yours!" David laughed and walked with stella to the front desk and then out the door.

The two proceeded to walk the five blocks back to their homes. They spent the whole time talking about the philosophy of Mill. Stella enjoyed his soft spoken mannerisms and they way he tried so hard not to spark ideological disagreement.

"Hmmmm" she thought to herself "this could be the beginning of a great friendship."


End file.
